Jurgen Bartsch

"From a certain age [around 13 or 14] I always had the feeling of no longer having any control over what I was doingÖ I prayed, and I hoped at least that it would do some good, but it didn't."

Modus operandi: Beats, strangles, dismembers. Plucks out their eyes.

Jurgens's adopted family did not allow him to play with other children. Thus, he never had friends, and never gained the skills to make friends. Being a perpetual outsider combined with social ineptness made him an easy target.

A movie made of his story, The Child I Never Was. Also a play, The Child-Killer: A Portrait of a Paedophile by Oliver Reese (based on Bartsch' correspondences).

Timeline

6 Nov 1946

Karl-Heinz Sadrozinski born to Anna Sadrozinski (who has tuberculosis), Essen. Anna leaves the baby at the hospital, unable to care for him.

Oct 1947

Adopted by the Gerhard and Gertrud Bartsch, who run a butcher shop.

1957

Attends Wiesengrund in Bonn.

1958

Attends Marienhausen Catholic school at age of 12. He is homosexually abused there, raped four times by choir leader Father PŁtlitz, and sometimes by other students.

1960

Commits a forced sex act with a boy named Axel, whom he allows to leave.

1961

Leaves school.

1962

Commits first murder, a boy named Klaus Jung.

7 Aug 1965

Murders a second boy, Peter Fuchs, near Essen-Holsterhausen.

7 Aug 1965

Murders a third boy, Ulrich Kahlweiss, with repeated hammer blows to the head.

1966

Murders a fourth boy, Manfred Grassmann.

18 Jun 1966

Tries for a fifth boy, Peter Frese, age 5. At some point Jurgen leaves for dinner and television, leaving the boy restrained. However, the boy escapes.

22 Jun 1966

Arrested after for the kidnapping and attempted murder of boy Peter Frese.

30 Nov 1965

Trial begins. Bartsch sentenced to life imprisonment. He attempts suicide several times.

Mar 1971

Plea bargaining; sentenced to ten years and further psychiatric care.

6 Apr 1971

Appeal. More information is brought forward regarding his parent's treatment, and his fucked-up life created thereby. New sentence is ten years plus further psychiatric care.